News

Maple Valley parents alarmed over man taking video

MAPLE VALLEY, Wash. — A Maple Valley police officer will be on campus at Lake Wilderness Elementary School for the next few days to calm the fears of parents.

On Tuesday morning, Cari Korpi saw a man taking video outside of the elementary school and confronted him and recorded him on her iPhone at the same time.

“His reaction was a concern and he obviously did not want me to know anything about what he was doing,” said Korpi.

She uploaded the video on the same day and it was shared more than 1,000 times on Facebook overnight.

“We decided to make that video viral in case somebody had some more information.  It's the lack of knowledge for us is the concern,” said another parent Cheryl Palmquist.

The man who took the video was Dustin Girten.  According to a King County sheriff’s report, he is the parent of two students at the school.

“The man is someone we have dealt with for quite some time. He has several complaints about traffic patterns here at the school,” said Kevin Patterson, public information officer for Tahoma Public Schools.

He believes Girten is collecting the video as evidence of the traffic problems.

“We try to manage traffic as best we can, but it's just a large amount of cars and buses in and out of here twice a day,” said Patterson.

Aside from the recent complaints about Girten taking video in front of the school, the school’s principal has also noted in an incident report that he disrupted staff by flipping off staff members and cursing at bus drivers.

Tahoma Schools filed a no-trespass order against Girten in November that will continue until February.

Despite the complaints from parents, King County sheriff’s deputies say he isn’t doing anything illegal.

“A lot of parents are upset before something bad happens, but we can't predict the future and he has not broken any laws at this point.  We're have an extra officer now here, hopefully to calm some of the fears of the parents but again, he hasn't done anything wrong,” said Sgt. Cindi West.

No one was home at Girten’s house when we went to ask about the video.

“We, I guess, aren't as concerned but I would be concerned if I didn’t know him,” said Girten’s neighbor Garrett Solberg.

Patterson said Tahoma Schools will reach out to Girten if school officials can find a solution to his complaints about the traffic issues.